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Air Gap Under Screen - Is That Because of Force Touch?

V

VFC

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Feb 6, 2012
514
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SE PA.
The Verge review notes that there is a noticeable air gap under the screen:

"The face of the Watch curves up off the sides, leaving a noticeable air gap above the display underneath."

Is that there because of the Force Touch pressure-sensitive input feature?
 
Norm from Tested said on their Youtube show today that the Apple Watch actually distinguishes a force touch from a regular touch based on the size of your fingerprint, rather than through any actual pressure sensitive technology. I'm not sure if he's right, but if so that would indicate that the gap is unrelated.
 
mightyjabba said:
Norm from Tested said on their Youtube show today that the Apple Watch actually distinguishes a force touch from a regular touch based on the size of your fingerprint, rather than through any actual pressure sensitive technology. I'm not sure if he's right, but if so that would indicate that the gap is unrelated.
Click to expand...

I was thinking a force touch would cause the entire watch face to move down slightly; thus the reason for the air gap between the glass dome and OLED display underneath. If not, then would that gap be a manufacturing defect?
 
That Verge guy is incredibly wrong. There is no air gap in the display; it's laminated to the front crystal.

Also, good luck getting a sapphire sheet to flex using just your finger... The reason it is so difficult to scratch is because it's super hard, and thus very inflexible.

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mightyjabba said:
Norm from Tested said on their Youtube show today that the Apple Watch actually distinguishes a force touch from a regular touch based on the size of your fingerprint
Click to expand...
How would that even work? People have different sized fingers on their hands, and different people have different sized hands (think wummin vs men, kids vs adults, small-handed people vs large handed and so on), and thus different sized fingers as well.

No, this is just silly rumors fueled by uninformed internet speculation.
 
A thing doesn't have to be moveable for force to register.

And I doubt it has anything to do with fingerprint size. Apple made it clear in the videos that the force is physically registered. Just like the new trackpad. Think of how Lenovo eraser nubs can determine pressure but don't move.

Also, every review I watched, the reviewers treated the force touch as a long press. But it's different from that. You don't need to hold down on it. You just need to press the screen as if your pressing a physical button.
 
If you listen to Jony Ive's description of force touch in the video about the Warch he distinctly uses the term "flexible retina display" when he talks about it.
 
Last edited:
Lennyvalentin said:
That Verge guy is incredibly wrong. There is no air gap in the display; it's laminated to the front crystal.

Also, good luck getting a sapphire sheet to flex using just your finger... The reason it is so difficult to scratch is because it's super hard, and thus very inflexible.
Click to expand...


I'm not talking about the screen flexing; I was wondering if the screen moved down like a mouse button.
 
VFC said:
I'm not talking about the screen flexing; I was wondering if the screen moved down like a mouse button.
Click to expand...

No. It does not. In fact, neither does the new Force Touch Touchpad on the MBP 13" or new MacBook. There are force sensors in the touchpad that can detect extremely tiny flexing of the aluminum. As for the watch, either a similar force detection mechanism is used (all materials will flex, just by very small amounts typically) or it is done with the ability of the capacitive touchscreen sensor to measure the size of the capacitance disruption (aka, how much your finger squished.)

The screen is not being pressed like a mouse button.

----------

In regards to the reviewer being very wrong about the air gap, I do have one theory on how the mistake was made. When Apple began laminating screens directly to the glass of iOS and Mac devices, a huge improvement that was witnessed was reduction in glare.

However, today we're talking about laminating a screen to a sapphire crystal. And let me speak from experience as a watch owner with sapphire crystal watches: they are super reflective. Glare is the name of the game. And while I've put this watch through pure hell and nary a scratch be found (the case not being so lucky) the fact remains, it's harder to clean than glass, and it reflects almost like a mirror.

So that said, Apple may have used better anti-reflective coatings, but, it's still unlikely that they eliminated this level of glare entirely and the added glare could be the big false indicator that there is no screen lamination.

Just a guess, of course, but, it is one rooted in reality and personal experience.
 
Lennyvalentin said:
How would that even work? People have different sized fingers on their hands, and different people have different sized hands (think wummin vs men, kids vs adults, small-handed people vs large handed and so on), and thus different sized fingers as well.
Click to expand...

If you press down on the screen hard, your fingerprint would start smaller and get bigger as your finger is compressed against it. It doesn't matter how big or small your finger is -- that's still going to be the case. However, I'm not saying that is actually what is happening. My feeling is that it is the same technology as what they used in the new trackpad, and Norm was just making things up.
 
phpmaven said:
he distinctly uses the term "flexible retina display" when he talks about it.
Click to expand...
It's pure marketing talk. It doesn't flex at all as used in the Watch, after it has been laminated into place. Likely, the base of the OLED display is a sheet of plastic film, hence the "flexible" bit, but it is made completely rigid through the lamination process to the front crystal. Like putting a sticker on a car window for example.

VFC said:
I'm not talking about the screen flexing; I was wondering if the screen moved down like a mouse button.
Click to expand...
Oh, well in that case, no. :) The crystal sits firmly on the case, probably glued into place like with the iPad screen. Apple loves gluing stuff together, to get rid of screwheads on their designs, which would make the Watch Edition the most expensive glued-together watch ever made. ;)

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mightyjabba said:
If you press down on the screen hard, your fingerprint would start smaller and get bigger as your finger is compressed against it. It doesn't matter how big or small your finger is -- that's still going to be the case.
Click to expand...
Yeah, naturally. Except the Watch has no way of knowing how big your finger is in its natural state. It has no frame of reference, so how could it determine force by looking at the size of finger touching the glass?

If you have small fingers, you couldn't even force press using this technique, because there'd be no way for your finger to produce a large enough contact area. Likewise if you have very big fingers it would be hard for you NOT to force press.

They're probably doing it with more sensitive capacitance sensors.
 
Lennyvalentin said:
That Verge guy is incredibly wrong. There is no air gap in the display; it's laminated to the front crystal.

Also, good luck getting a sapphire sheet to flex using just your finger... The reason it is so difficult to scratch is because it's super hard, and thus very inflexible.

----------


How would that even work? People have different sized fingers on their hands, and different people have different sized hands (think wummin vs men, kids vs adults, small-handed people vs large handed and so on), and thus different sized fingers as well.

No, this is just silly rumors fueled by uninformed internet speculation.
Click to expand...

One of the Apple videos shows a representation of the crystal flexing, or am I seeing it wrong :confused:
 
Lennyvalentin said:
.......

[/COLOR]
Yeah, naturally. Except the Watch has no way of knowing how big your finger is in its natural state. It has no frame of reference, so how could it determine force by looking at the size of finger touching the glass?

If you have small fingers, you couldn't even force press using this technique, because there'd be no way for your finger to produce a large enough contact area. Likewise if you have very big fingers it would be hard for you NOT to force press.

They're probably doing it with more sensitive capacitance sensors.
Click to expand...

Your BMI would also complicate the sensing of the finger force. I have very low body fat. My finger print contact area would not increase that much if I pushed hard on a watch face. Hopefully we will find out soon how the AW senses force.
 
camtechman56 said:
One of the Apple videos shows a representation of the crystal flexing, or am I seeing it wrong :confused:
Click to expand...
It's the Jony Ive narrated introduction to the Watch, isn't it? Anyway, it's a graphical illustration in a marketing video to sell the concept of a force-sensitive display. It shouldn't be interpreted literally. :)
 
Apple is a bit vague about how Force Touch works, and frankly, their marketing blurb could be interpreted in several different ways.

force-touch.png

My own reading is that there are pressure transducers around the edge of the display, but it could easily be read in other ways as well.
 
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